


too many emotions, but you let me blossom in the dark

by ellalopez



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: F/M, cheleanor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-07
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-08-25 07:05:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16656508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellalopez/pseuds/ellalopez
Summary: he wasn't supposed to find out this way.eleanor had imagined maybe five different possible scenarios, three of them involving her texting instead of telling him face to face.it was how it always worked with her, after all.(but maybe he's the reason she wants to change.)





	too many emotions, but you let me blossom in the dark

**Author's Note:**

> title is from rachel platten's "collide"! this is set immediately after the squad get taken to janet's void, except, like, my version because i wrote half of this before the episode aired. after it aired though i only changed things like the dark void to a white void, added more chidi philosophical stuff, and that's about it. the rest is all me!

**GROWING** up in a terrible environment and a family that couldn't care less about her, Eleanor occasionally wondered what it'd be like to escape to a dark, endless void and just stay there forever. It would be pretty boring, she assumed, being nine years old and only having a few possessions to her name. Plus, there'd be no one else there, and she didn't want to be alone. So when she got old enough to get out and leave the hell she called home, she didn't think twice. Her parents didn't give the papers a second glance. The thoughts of the void shoved aside to the corners of her mind, still there but not as needed.

Looking back, she remembers getting drunk when she barely met the age requirements. ( _You're free now. Relax.)_

Sleeping with strangers and stealing their wallets. _(You're free now. You can do what you want.)_

Owning the title of an Arizona dirtbag. _(You're free now-)_

Then there was her near-death experience. It threw her life out of order and she became a genuinely good person for six months. How did she pull it off, anyway?

_(-I don't want to end up like them.)_

But in the snap of a finger, the instance of a butterfly flapping its wings, the Arizona dirtbag was back as strong as ever.

She wandered into a bar on her birthday, chatted up a bartender, who left her with a simple sentence.

_What do we owe to each other?_

_**━━━━━━━━━━━━** _

She made the impulse decision to fly to Australia the next day.

There was something about the moral philosophy professor in the video she watched she couldn't shake. Something about him told her to find him, meet him. She was free now, had been for over a decade.

So she went, and left the life she built behind.

_**━━━━━━━━━━━━** _

_"Are you Chidi Ana... Kendrick?"_

**_"Anagonye, and yes."_ **

_"From the long, nerdy video about the little voice that tells you to be good?"_

**_"From the Cassat Foundation lecture series on the practical applications of ethical theory. Yes."_ **

_"Great. Hi. My name is Eleanor Shellstrop. Can we talk?"_

_**━━━━━━━━━━━━** _

They talk _(she loves the way his eyebrows shoot up when he says 'absolutism')_. He teaches _(and God does he look cute in those dumb glasses)_ and she listens and learns _(she memorizes the colours of his turtlenecks and gets him one for his birthday)._ She helps him with Simone  _(and shoves the hurt she feels aside when he starts to spend less time with her)_ and he helps her become better.

Days blur into weeks, and weeks into months, and they meet Tahani and Jason and for once in her life Eleanor feels like she has a home. Then it gets destroyed and put back together with a portal and a failed plan, and Eleanor swears under her breath as they figure out the bigger reason behind this all. They get informed of their deaths, and their revivals, from a sharply dressed demon named Michael and his badass information interface, Janet. They hear about the afterlife, the crazy ass timeline, and they each snap in different ways.

But even when things go off the rails, they help each other. They always do.

_**━━━━━━━━━━━━** _

Eleanor tries not to collapse and crumple to the ground when she gets her memories back.

_(She doesn't have to end up like them.)_

"There's a real possibility that I'm in love with you again. Here. On this plane of existence. Now."

There's a pause. A beat. Chidi blinks at her, his charcoal grey eyes wide.

She could take it back. She should take it back.

She doesn't.

_**━━━━━━━━━━━━** _

_(and now they're in a void and Eleanor can't breathe, and Chidi's squeezing her hand so tight, a silent promise that they'll be okay.)_

_(she believes him.)_

_**━━━━━━━━━━━━** _

"Hey guys! Isn't this so cool?" Janet chirps, and suddenly they're everywhere but they're nowhere, here but they're not. Michael stands next to Janet, both of them the only ones visible. Eleanor can sense Chidi beside her, but he's not  _there,_ and Tahani's voice rings out from her far left.

"This most certainly is not! What am I wearing? Why can't I see myself, or anyone? Can I speak to your manager?" Eleanor snorts. Chidi's teeth stop chattering.

"Are we invisible?!" Jason shrieks, and his voice echoes throughout the void. He's delighted and continues to make animal calls. Janet claps her hands, and they all flicker into existence.

Eleanor stumbles forward, about to fall on the seriously trippy vast space of nothing, and Chidi grips her arm and pulls her back into place. They're all standing on pure white, the only things of colour being them, and Jason stops making animal calls to frown. "Hey, why aren't we invisible anymore?"

There's a soft smile on Janet's face, suppressed emotions and hidden adoration clear in her expression. And suddenly Eleanor understands, and she coughs loudly, marking her presence.

"Jason, buddy, why don't you, Janet, Michael and Tahani go make yourselves uh, comfortable, and Cheedster and I will be over... there." She gestures vaguely to her right, and Janet tilts her head at Eleanor.  _Thank you,_ she mouths.  _Anytime, babe,_ she says back. Janet summons a cute living room set for them to sit on as they formulate a plan, and Eleanor slips her hand into Chidi's and drags him away. When she's satisfied with the distance, she stops in place. It's solid ground, somehow, and she shakes her head, overwhelmed. Chidi joins her hesitantly, his face still twisted in his trademark existential crisis mode.

"So. We need to talk about, uh, my confession." Eleanor starts, and she scratches the back of her neck, feeling itchy and weird. He stays quiet, his mind racing at a million thoughts a minute, but his shoulders relax slightly, and he moves closer to Eleanor. She tries again, grabbing his shoulders so he looks at her.

"Remember that weird ass timeline? Jeremy Bearimy or whatever? Yeah, well, somehow, in every single reboot, no matter what time it was on earth or in the afterlife, even in that dot from the i... you helped me. I just- we've been through a lot together." She's tearing up, choking on her words, and she hates how stupid this is. She's not used to feeling so _much._

"Eleanor, I-" His voice sounds tired, his eyes unreadable behind his thick-rimmed glasses, and a part of Eleanor wants to gag. She's never paid attention and noticed this much about anyone, ever.  _Except him, of course._

Chidi tries again, shoving the thoughts of philosophy and how  _so many_ of his favourite theories are being proved wrong away, and looks at her, really looks at her, before she falls apart. Janet looks over at them, alarmed, when she sees pieces of the void start to break off and float around. Eleanor's crying now, sobs escaping her like hiccups, and Chidi grabs her hands to steady her.

"You're one of the bravest, strongest, sharpest people I know. When I was hanging on by a thread, stirring those peeps in the chilli with no sense of life left, you gave me a purpose. You basically saved my life, Eleanor. I might not have those memories you have, or feel the exact emotions that you feel, but I do know that you mean a lot to me. I've never been more sure about anything. I think... I think I love you too." He says the last few words so low that if Eleanor wasn't hanging onto his every word, they wouldn't have been said at all. 

Eleanor bites her lip, looking up at him, a smile threatening to break across her face _(but she's still so anxious, preparing herself for heartbreak- it's how it always ends)_. "You're not just saying that because I might cause the world to end?"

"No, Eleanor. I'm saying it because you deserve it, despite how much you hate people saying nice things to your face." His heart is hammering in his chest, and he closes the distance between them just as the void's about to crack. Eleanor's standing on her tiptoes, her arms around his neck and his hands on her waist, and the damage to the void fades as if it was never there. The chaos in Chidi's head seizes, like a tape recorder on pause, and he doesn't worry, doesn't focus on anything other than Eleanor Shellstrop. They hold each other, Chidi carrying her because of their height difference, and Eleanor's never felt safer, more loved in her life.

 __It's there, a silent murmur in the distance, a gentle breeze on a summer day-

_(You're home now.)_

**Author's Note:**

> leave me a comment, even a short "i hate it" is fine! (but don't actually do that. i'm weak.) you can find me at @swiftsantiagos on twitter btw


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